Update 10/2011. I made a new, much better quality video about managing presets. You can watch it here.
by Gavin Seim: If you searched around, you’ll might have stumbled across the article I wrote some time back on PPS about installing Lightroom Presets. We photographers tend to be such visual people however and I felt a video would make it easier. We’ll cover installing organizing and backing up pretty much any kind of Lightroom preset. Brush presets, develop presets, you name it. Here it is.
Or, direct download MP4 HD video. 146MB, Right click and “Save As”
I just wanted to stop by and thank you from the bottom of my heart for posting this video. I have had Lightroom for about a year {was scared of it at first} and I am not trying to learn a few extra things. Thank you again! I successfully installed some presets. woo hoo.
Thanks for the tutorial! Appreciate it.
Thank you. Very helpful to find out how to get folders in User Presets and how to back everything up. I’m doing the backup from LR2 before I upgrade to LR3 so I can make sure I don’t lose anything.
Thank you, Thank you for the tutorial! Appreciate it.
Gavin Very useful. Thank you.
Thank you so much, you have a talent in giving tutorials like this and your voice is unique and fun to listen to! :]
Gavin…
I’ve been an aspiring photo enthusiast for a few decades and after all these years have received tons of encouragement to take the next step with it (in the business sense). I just found your site yesterday searching Google on Lr presets. I’m brand new to Lr… like just a few days new. I’m also fairly new to Mac… like just a few months. I pride myself on being incredibly computer savvy, especially through acquiring tips/tricks/info from gurus like yourself that enable me to quickly get up-to-speed from invaluable vids, posts, podcasts (yes, in just one day I’ve covered a lot through all of your sites). THANKS! I have your PW3 and CF presets in the shopping cart and ready to push the button as soon as I sync with my wife (no surprises). Can’t wait to get started with ’em!! Thanks!
By the way, I recognized the Pasco suspension bridge in one of your photos. I just travelled through the tri-cities area last weekend and told myself I’m allotting time on my next trip through (from Boise to Coeur d’Alene) to get shots of that beautiful bridge. Wenatchee is a beautiful place, too. Looking forward to my next trip through that area.
Thanks Jeff. Hope you enjoy and let me know if you have questions. Nest time you come thru you’ll have to swing by the studio and say hello… Gav
i downloaded a bunch of free prests on preset heaven and most of them are zip files and are grey meaning unimportable when i try to import them Why is that, how do i get them in LR?
I can’t speak for preset heaven download, but you did unzip before trying to import correct… Gav
Gav, many thanks for the power workflow3 presets, they’ve help me speed up a lot in lightroom. 2.5 were the 1st presets I brought and powerworkflow are still Some of the best presets I’ve found! Great stuff & keep up the work! I’ll try some of your brush presets soon!
Thanks. Daz
I have lightroom 1.1 – It does not have that option “show lightroom presets.” – Please help. Thanks.
Ok, I now have the Lightroom 3. Awesome, but it does not show the presets on the left like yours in your tutorial. How do I put it there? Thanks. Ed
Ed you have to expand the panel on the left (in Develop Module. When you do, the presets panel will be in that panel.
Thank you so much. Always looking for ways to improving my use of LR3. Enjoyed the detailed information and learned so much in a short time.
Hello! I’ve been trying to figure out how to download presets and such onto my Lightroom. Found your website and was hoping for the best, but unfortunalty i followed your step by step and no success. I hope you can help. Immeditely i get stuck on when you say go down to prefences and clik on it, mine has a preference, but dosn’t have the option just to click. It comes up with some other things. I don’t know what to do…i hope you can help me. thanks.
Can’t help you with so little information Tori. Ultimately you need to fond the presets folder. You’re probably looking at the wrong panel. Alternately you could import direction into the Develop module using the + symbol on the presets list but it’s less organized. If it’s still giving you trouble, feel free to email me directly with some more details.
Gav
thank you 😀
Hi, Google pointed me to your site, very inspiring indeed. I am interested in your preset however I am slightly concerned about color, most of your presets were probably developed with white skin tone color, how much twicking would I have to do to achieve a great effect on black skin color? Any info would be great.
Jeremy in general the preset itself is not relevant to the skin color. Proper skin color is dependent on how you expose your images and at times white balance. But most of my presets work independent of white balance, allowing it to be set with the auto presets or manually, and then left alone.
Feel free to email if you have more questions, effects@seimstudiios.com
Gav